Final Chapter:
The Future of Humanity
“BRING ME CLAIRE FRANÇOIS. For every day you don’t, I shall lay waste to a country of this world.”
The Demon Queen’s declaration was outrageous. But with her power, it was possible she would actually be able to do it. How many people would take her words seriously, though? The majority of people in this world hadn’t even heard of the Demon Queen.
As such questions floated through my mind, the Demon Queen continued.
“For those unaware of my existence, allow me to demonstrate some of my power. What you see here is a mountain in Bauer.”
An image appeared in my mind: Mt. Sassal, towering over twelve-thousand-feet tall and striking awe in those who laid eyes upon it. It had to be the Demon Queen’s magic showing me this.
“Observe.”
A loud rumbling sounded from the east.
“Whoa?!” The image in my mind changed to that of the imperial capital, Ruhm, from which a blue beam surged forth.
The beam flew over the distant border of Bauer and hit the side of Mt. Sassal. The air around us suddenly grew cold as the earth roared and the building trembled. Everyone dropped to the floor and covered their heads.
The shaking continued for a few moments more. After it stopped, I heard Rod’s dumbfounded voice.
“No… You’ve gotta be kidding me, right?”
He expressed what was on everyone’s mind. What we saw was unbelievable. The Demon Queen’s magic had frozen Mt. Sassal in its entirety.
Logically, I understood what had happened. The Demon Queen had most likely used the same attack spell I possessed, Absolute Zero, a super-aptitude water-attribute spell that instantly froze its target. The only difference was that she had frozen an entire volcano, and from several hundred miles away. No matter how hard I tried, such a feat would be out of reach for me.
The situation was a bit different, but it reminded me of this line a manga antagonist said when they were flooring the main character: “Kafrizz? No, that just now was only my weakest spell, Frizz.”
I was living the same disbelief the main character must have felt then.
“Hopefully now you understand my words are not mere threats. I have more than enough power to bring humanity to its knees.” Indifferent and devoid of emotion, the Demon Queen went on. “You have two weeks to bring Claire François to Ruhm, the capital of Nur. This is what she looks like.”
The image in my mind changed again, this time showing me Claire. It was almost like a wanted poster. Wait, no, it basically was a wanted poster.
“I trust your leaders will make the wise choice.”
With those last words, the telepathy came to an end. The leaders in the conference room with us got to work immediately.
“Hilda, prepare the emergency telepathy broadcast!” Philine ordered.
“At once!” Hilda bolted out of the conference room.
“Thane, you should return to Bauer for now,” Rod said. “The citizens saw what just happened up close and are likely in a state of panic.”
“But what of the battle with the Demon Queen?” Thane asked with a somber look.
“I hate to be this blunt, Brother, but with how long it’s been since you’ve fought, I don’t think you’ll be much help in a fight,” Yu said.
“Humph.”
Yu gave one last push. “Please, leave this to Rod and I.”
Dole spoke up as well. “Your Majesty, there are things only you alone can do. At this moment, the people need your presence.”
“I understand. I’ll leave managing Bauer’s forces in your hands, Rod, Yu. Dole, come with me.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
Thane and Dole quickly paced out the conference room.
“What’ll you do, Manaria?” William asked.
“I’ll stay here. I don’t mean to sound arrogant, but you guys will need my strength to fight the Demon Queen. Sousse needs me as well, I’m sure, but this takes priority. I’ll just have to trust the royal family and the nobles back home to hold down the fort. What about you, William?”
“Me? Hmm… I guess I’ll head back to the Alpes once we figure out a bit more of our course of action. I mean, it’s not like I’d be any good in a fight, ha ha!” Even in this situation, William didn’t lay off the jokes. Or maybe he felt a need to lighten the mood?
“The question is what we do about the Demon Queen’s demand…” Misha said.
A short silence followed.
Flustered, I broke it. “Wh-what do you mean? We’ll do nothing, obviously. Right?”
There was no way we could hand Claire to the Demon Queen. Absolutely not.
“Rae, it’s not that simple,” Claire said.
“Miss Claire…”
“I’m sure everyone here feels the same way, but do you think the rest of the world will agree, after what they saw happen to Mt. Sassal?”
I couldn’t find the words to refute her. What we had seen was simply that shocking.
Mountains commanded a powerful presence. Their existence alone made people feel awe. What was more, Mt. Sassal wasn’t an ordinary mountain but a massive volcano. Yet the Demon Queen had frozen it solid in the blink of an eye. It was a feat beyond human understanding. I couldn’t imagine many had the courage to face such a monster.
“So what, then? Are we supposed to just hand you over knowing you’ll be killed?!” I demanded. There was no way I’d allow Claire to be a sacrifice. We couldn’t even allow her to be killed in the first place; the only reason humanity hadn’t yet met its demise was because Claire still lived in the loops. “If it’s going to come down to that, let’s just run away! I’ll follow you to the ends of the earth if I have to!”
“And where would we run? That telepathy reached the whole world. There’s nowhere for me to hide,” Claire said with a smile.
I was crushed. I kept thinking that Claire was choosing to walk to her own death again. But I really should have known better than to let myself think that.
“Don’t make such a face, Rae. I have no intention of dying.”
“Miss Claire?”
I saw it now. Her smile wasn’t that of a woman resigned to her fate. It was that of one determined to fight.
“Rae, I swear I’ll uphold our promise this time.”
“Our promise?”
“The one I broke at the time of the revolution: my promise to never give up. Do you remember it?”
“Oh…” I did remember it: After losing a wager against me—twice, might I add—I’d had her swear to God to never give up no matter what happened. “Miss Claire…”
“There has to be a way through this,” she said. “I simply refuse to roll over and die like a dog.”
“Miss Claire!” Unable to contain my happiness, I hugged her.
“Wha—Rae!” she said, flustered. “There are people watching! Let. Me. Go!”
“Aha ha ha. That’s a relief to hear, Claire. There’d be nothing we could do to help if you decided to throw in the towel,” Rod said.
“You’ll help us then?” Claire asked while I was still hugging her.
“You bet. I just gained another reason to knock that Demon Queen down a peg, after all…”
“Oh? What’s that, then?” Claire asked.
“She went and did in Mt. Sassal, the mountain that killed my pops. I was hoping to conquer it on my own two feet sometime soon.” Rod had a conflicted look on his face. It was unusual to see him look anything but lighthearted.
“Master Rod…” Claire said, worried. Then she looked down at me. “Enough! How much longer do you intend to cling to me?!”
“C’mooon, just a bit longerrr.”
“Aha ha ha!” Rod laughed.
Eventually, I had my fill of Claire and released her.
“Jeez…” Claire sighed. “Returning to the point, how do we move forward from here? It will be somewhat difficult to explain our situation to the leaders of other nations.”
“You’re right…” I admitted. Putting aside whether they fully believed the visions, those present with us just now had seen everything TAIM had to offer and had at least agreed that we couldn’t let the demons lay their hands on Claire. But how in the world were we supposed to convince other people of the same thing without using TAIM’s virtual reality?
As the two of us racked our brains, TAIM said, “I could lend some aid.”
“Really? How?” I asked.
“I could use the authority of the Spiritual Church to convince the masses.”
That was certainly a possibility. The Spiritual Church had followers around the world and was the most influential global religion to boot. They’d given relief to the poor and medical services to the people for ages, and in the process, they had become a spiritual pillar for the masses. Unlike the governments that often existed far away from the eyes of the people, the Spiritual Church was with them in their day-to-day lives. There was a fair chance that the people would listen to what the Church had to say.
“But would that be enough?” Claire asked. “We only have two weeks left. How are we to convince the world in that short span of time?”
“We’ll use telepathy on the whole world, just like the Demon Queen,” said TAIM. “I have the power to do as much. Of course, the words of a single cardinal like Lilly Lilium, or Yu Bauer, who is only well known in Bauer, won’t have much effect.”
“That’s true…” Claire said.
“Oh, why not show everyone that virtual reality thing like you did for us?” I suggested.
“That won’t do. The truth of this world is beyond the comprehension of the average person, and even if some could understand it, there’s no guarantee they’d be supportive. They might even come to blame you personally for what happened, Rae Taylor. It’s too risky.”
She had a point there. The fact that this world was looping endlessly was hard to grasp. Even if some did understand it, the one who was trying to end the loops was me (technically, not really—you know what I mean), so they might well blame me for this mess, and that would just add to our current problems.
“So what do we do?” Claire asked TAIM.
“We will have the pope, Clarice Répète III, address the people. She too is someone who knows the truth of this world.”